Measles children 'treated as lepers'

Parents at the centre of a measles alert today angrily claimed they are being treated like "lepers" because of fears their children are carrying the disease.

Families whose children attend the White House School in Clapham should find out today whether any have tested positive for the illness.

Twenty-two have been tested after coming into close contact with three others confirmed as having measles at two nursery schools.

The outbreak has occurred as public health experts warn of a reemergence of the disease because the takeup of the controversial measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine has fallen to dangerously low levels in some parts of London.

Parents at the White House School said their children were being made to feel like outcasts since the news broke that pupils there and at the Abacus Nursery in Streatham were among those suspected of having measles.

In a sign of the tension gripping the area, even those who have been given the MMR jab are being prevented from mixing with their playmates.

A woman who has sons aged two and four at the White House School said: "We feel like aliens. I have had messages on my answerphone telling me not to bring my children round to their friends' homes. Both my children are immunised and I think this is absolutely awful for them."

Another mother said: "We are being treated like lepers. People don't want our children mixing with theirs."

A woman whose six-year-old son and four-year-old daughter attend the school said a fellow parent had requested her child stay away from a singing class because she was worried about the disease spreading.

The mother said: "I know of children at this school who are not being invited to tea any more at their friends' houses. My sister-in-law's nanny was told not to take her child to a friend's house. People who have not immunised their children are getting hysterical. There is a huge panic."

Only 73 per cent of children in Lambeth, Southwark and Lewisham Health Authority have received the MMR jab - well below the 95 per cent level needed to give what the Department of Health calls "herd immunity". A Health Department spokesman said: "This means it is not just children who have not had the jab who are at risk, but those below the age at which it is given."

In a further complication it emerged today the suspected cases at the White House School did include those who had the MMR vaccine but not the booster. The first vaccine is supposed to give 90 per cent protection against measles and the booster, given two years later, another nine per cent.

Sarah Wilkinson said that a friend of her seven-year-old daughter Georgina, who attends the White House, was one of the measles cases despite receiving the first MMR jab.

Helen Spiller, meanwhile, said her five-year-old daughter had two classmates with suspected measles. She said: "The doctors said that they don't know why the children are getting it if they have had the first jab. They are checking to see if this is a particularly mutated strain."

Hazel Forbes said her two boys had passed on measles to their 16-month-old sister, Clara, despite having had MMR.

In a move bound to increase parents' suspicion of the triple vaccine, a scientist who said he had found a possible link between the measles virus and a new form of bowel disease and autism today defended his work.

The research, to be published in Molecular Pathology in April, found the measles virus in 83 per cent of gut samples from children with autism and bowel disorders but only in seven per cent of children without these conditions. The findings prompted the team, led by Professor John O'Leary, to conclude the virus may act as a "immunological trigger".

He warned the study had not looked at whether the children tested had received MMR jabs and advised against jumping to conclusions.